This new variety of lily plant originated as a seedling selected from a group of seedlings planted by me at Sandy, Oreg., with seeds produced by using the clonal cultivar `Peachblush` as the seed parent and as the pollen parent, a pink seedling selected from the cross of [(`Enchantment`.times.an upright, pink Asiatic seedling).times.`Gypsy`]; the object of this breeding effort being the production of lilies in shades of pink and peach well suited to forcing for cut flower production out of season, heretofore unknown in the lily breeding art.
This particular seedling was selected for propagation because of its deep pink, cream-throated coloration and copious spotting in the center only of the flower, a color pattern unique in this type of lily, and this selected seedling was asexually reproduced by me at Sandy, Oreg., with such satisfactory results that successive generations of this plant, produced by bulb scale propagation and by natural propagation from bulblets, have demonstrated that the novel and distinctive characteristics of this new plant hold true under asexual propagation from generation to generation and appear to be firmly fixed.
This new variety remains relatively tall and is not overly susceptible to bud abortion when forced into flower out of season as a cut flower plant; and in addition the clone possesses to a high degree the desirable characteristics of hybrid vigor, great hardiness, and disease resistance, as well as possessing all of the desired characteristics of excellence of form, color and habit. The clone is vigorous and a good grower and propagator, as observed at Sandy, Oreg.
This plant is well suited to forcing out of season when the bulbs are dug at the appropriate time and properly precooled; October-dug bulbs, properly precooled and potted in January, will flower under glass in western Oregon, with no supplemental lighting and at moderate greenhouse temperatures, in an average of sixty-five to seventy-five days.